February 2008
Summary
2nd February 2008
Was able to finish off the LHS Calliper fitting today and torque up the 41mm bolt correctly on the new driveshaft. Also, bled the brakes thoroughly.
No pictures today, as this is more or less redoing stuff that I had previously already attempted. However, one concern when looking ahead to the next section (fitting interior carpets) is that apparentally the inertia reel seatbelts should have already been fitted by the factory. However, my inertia reel seatbelts have come with the kit but are not fitted to the car. There are no instuctions on how to fit these, so need to request advice before being able to start the fitting of the carpets.
I can see where they are supposed to fit as there is a trangular recess next to the rear damper, but there are no bolt holes to place the reels....
....However, having said all of this, I'm considering not fitting the inertia reels at all, but opting for a harness instead. I remember that the vast majority of the cars I looked at in the showroom had harnesses fitted as did the one that I test drove. Certainly the one I test drove felt very secure with a harness, so I may well go down this road instead.
I mentioned carpet above, but I originally wasn't going to bother with carpet when I started out, but have reconsidered and my order has arrived. I was surprised to see how many pieces of carpet came in the pack. There was must about 20 pieces, all of varying sizes and shapes. I'm sure that will be quite tricky to get right, but worth it I think.
Other than that just did a few small checks. I checked that the reverse light and rear fog light (already fitted to the car) work. The reverse light needs to be checked, because the switch for this is attached to the gearbox, and once the carpet is installed, you can't get at this without ripping the carpet back out again if there is a fault in the switch/wiring etc.
I filled the washer bottle and tested it works, which it does. Also, I touched the two horn connectors wires together with another piece of wire to check the horns work, which they do.
Finally, I put it in gear for the first time. Without wanting to cause too many vibrations as the car is still off the ground, I just put it in first gear and let the clutch out without revving the engine at all. There were no problems here. I also took it to second gear on minimum revs and put it in to reverse, all seemingly without any problems, although there was a kind of a whine sound when I put it in reverse. Don't know if this is anything to worry about at the moment - I suspect it isn't, but will check.
9th February 2008
Quite a productive day today. Fitted the carpets, roll bar and hoodsticks.
This shows the carpet that fits behind the seats. The vinyl strip is attached using adhesive to the square tube at the top
of the seat back panel. The carpet must fit flat at the transmission tunnel, so this needed to be cut to fit properly.
This shows the transmission cover tunnel that is attached with rivets. This helps stop water etc getting into the cockpit from the road.
Next is fitting the transmission tunnel carpet, after which the transmission tunnel top can be fitted after the adhesive is dry.
These two pictures show the boot carpet fitted. This was a tricky job involving quite a large number of pieces, most of which had to be trimmed
to fit correctly. The base carpet is not fitted with adhesive, but the edges are tucked down the sides of the boot floor.
Everything else is fixed with adhesive.
This shows an overall picture of the cockpit and boot carpet.
The next thing I thought was to fit the harnesses (which I did end up opting for and they arrived in the week), but actually the roll bar, hoodsticks and boot cover must be fitted first.
The roll bar was simple to fit. I'm not sure however if the hoodstick and hoodstraps have been assmebled correctly.
I've currently assembled the strpas so that they both come between the centre diagnoal bar on the roll bar. Also,
I'm not sure of the front hood stick is the correct way round - I've got it so that the curved bar is 'leaning' backwards.
I'll need to check this with BlatChat.
16th February 2008
Another day on the interior trim today.
Last weekend, I had the hood straps on incorrectly, so that was fixed to allow the hood sticks to be folded into the boot.
Before the 4 point harnesses can be fitted, the boot cover needs to be in place. There was a metal strip in the boot cover which had to be removed
if 4 point harnesses are being fitted. This shows the 4 point harnesses installed in the car, along with the back of the tunnel top cover.
This shows a picture towards the front of the tunnel top cover, with the gear knob in place. It was fairly tricky fitting this top as there
is not much room at the footwell end of the tunnel top, and it is a very tight fit over the handbrake.
The tunnel top is not secured in place with any fixings - it just clips over the tunnel.
Finally today, fitted the sill protector, rubber tubing and knee protector on the drivers side. The sill protector needs a number of holes drilled into it to line up with the corresponding holes in the pannel. However, drilling these was not easy to drill with a hand drill. The build manual talks about lining the sill protector up, and drilling into it through the existing holes in the side pannel, but this was diffifcult as the drill bit slides around a lot due to the material and curve of the sill protector. Luckily I have a bench drill, so was able to do this very accuratley in the end, although it was a bit more time consuming, but I'm pleased with the finish.
This shows the drivers side sill protector from the top of the wheel arch pannel. What may not be clear from this photo
is that there is a length of rubber tubing that goes between the sill protector and the pannel, from the foot well all the way up
to the top of the wheel arch pannel (in two pieces). This all had to be rivetted into place, which was hard work, but I'm very pleased with
the finish now it's it place! Got to do the passenger side now though as well.....that's a job for next time.
23rd February 2008
Another day on the interior trim.
Did the LHS sill protector, tubing and knee protectors. This side was actually harder to do because the few rivets that had been fitted by Caterham weren't correctly located, making it quite difficult to 'flatten' out the interior pannels. Got there in the end though.
I was then thinking that I would quite easily get the two seats fitted - after all, it is just 4 nuts, bolts and washers per seat! However, it didn't up being as simple as that as there was quite a bit of trial and error regarding the drilling of the holes in the floor. I was given a template by Caterham and used that as a guide, but the bolts would not pass through the seat rail and into the drilled holes in the floor. On about the 5th attempt, all four bolts were in place, and the holes that I have made are more than covered by the large washer, which is good news. Also, accessing the bolts at the rear of the seat to tighten was time consuming due to them being difficult to access, but in the end the seat was installed correctly.
This shows a picture of the drivers side seat installed.
As an aside, I've noticed a leak in the front right brake calliper, so Caterham have sent a replacement down. It does mean that the brakes will have to be rebled once the calliper is refitted.
Also, a bit of a milestone today for another reason. 23rd February 2007 was the first time I entered the Caterham garage and sat in a car. 12 months on, I'm probably 75%-80% through the build of one of my own!